By Roger Lord, redacteur emeritus
Translation: Ruby Harrold-Claesson, attorney at
law
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Why do Swedish children shout? Why are they so hysterical, so discontented, so badly behaved? The fact that they are different from children in other parts of the world is obvious.
I am having lunch at a place in Gothenburg. It
is not because of the sake of the food that I am eating there, it is neither
better nor worse than the food in the restaurant close by. It is because of the
sign. The sign reads: "Children under ten are not allowed, we do not have
a play area."
I just want peace and quiet when I am eating.
At other places I turn away at the door if I catch a glimpse of Swedish
families with children there.
There are two dominant international guidebooks
that many young people use when they travel. One is Lonely Planet and the other
is Rough Guide. The latter is more complete, more detailed and its latest
edition was published only recently in Scandinavia.
Rough Guide takes pleasure in rating countries.
They have a top-ten list and they have a bottom-ten list.
On the top-ten list you will find Gamla Stan
(the Old City) and the Ice cave in Joukkasjärvi.
The interesting thing about this new
edition is however the bottom-ten list. It has been revised since the previous edition.
Rough Guide's conclusion is that the
very worst with Scandinavia is Swedish children. Swedish children are at the
top of the bottom list, where you find partying Nordic people on the Finnish
ferries further down in the ranking. The Editors write critically that Swedish
children in too great numbers behave very badly in public places, "as if
they lacked parents to take care of them."
I have made the same observations
both at home and abroad. The further south you come, the more obvious the
difference. For example, a Greek child can run without shouting hysterically,
which a Swedish child obviously cannot do anymore. A Greek child can run and
laugh at the same time, while Swedish children when they try to do the same,
instead of laughing they scream hysterically. And when they do not get their
way they scream hysterically until they get what they want.
The high voice levels at the day care centres
have in some places been classed as an employment hazard. But the matter is not
being debated, no one asks the given question: "Why do Swedish children
scream?"
The absence of the debate may depend on the
fact that we do not want to know the answer: "There is something wrong
with the kids."
Because, what would we do?
The absence of the debate can just as well
depend on the fact that we are not allowed to blame the parents; they work hard
and do as much as they can. What we do not think about is that the absence of
shame can also be pathological. Shame in itself is nothing negative, it can
prevent us from making mistakes.
Time after time we hear alarming reports,
children's and young persons' mental health problems are increasing. More
resources are demanded for child psychiatry and school nurses. But is the
solution really more treatment and more money? Isn't it time that we seriously
ask ourselves the question if we no longer really understand the needs of
children? And that we should stop
believing only the answers that confirm us adults?
Ethnologists have for some time noticed a decisive difference between children
in different cultures. In cultures where mother and child live close together,
where the child is breast-fed the first two years and is carried close to its
mother's body, where they sleep in the same bed, the child seems more
harmonious than in other places. A professor of Ethnology in Uppsala (whose
name I have forgotten, unfortunately) wrote about this recently in a book. He
mentioned the "scream phenomenon" and stated that it wasn't to be
found in these cultures. He described also that [children] in southern cultures
have constant access to closeness and food. Mother does not feed the child at
fixed times, instead the child is fed when it feels for it. In that way the
child is never full to overflowing, nor is it ever hungry. A hungry child may
perhaps think that its food is finished forever? What do we know, anyway?
Is television responsible for the strange things that
are happening here? Only some week ago a Swedish researcher published an alarm
report that children under two years of age should not watch television. Their
brains become damaged by to many impressions at the same time, which leads to
permanently "wrongly connected" brains. How many Swedish parents took
that report seriously? How many of them saw the report at all?
Other researchers claim that modern carriages
and prams where children sit facing forwards are not good either. The child
feels most security when it has eye contact with its parent. What is happening?
The sale of "wrong turned" carriages increases most. Doesn't anyone
care?
In any case. It is time to find out why the
kids are the way they are.
PS You parents who believe that the hotel owner
at the charter resort loves your screaming children are completely wrong. What
he is wondering most about is how you as parents can stand living with the
shame of having such wild children.
Yours truly.
Linda Skugge: We are bringing up a generation of
monsters
Translation: Ruby
Harrold-Claesson